IVF by Ela Brave and Iván Brave
“This is your sperm cell,” the nurse practitioner says. He draws an oval with a squiggly line on the white crunchy paper of the medical exam table. Meanwhile I’m annoyed and feeling like a dumb lab rat.
Esme learns her lesson by Cole Beauchamp and Sumitra Singam
A finger on the lips, a rubbing of the brow, a curling of the lip even at the threshold. This is the snip-snip rhythm Esme finds at Nana’s now that Grampa is gone.
To Brown Duck, Potters’ Mill Pond, Brynby Green, Lincolnshire LN12 0BX by Philippa Bowe and Karen Walker
Dear Duck, here there are only gulls for company, some are large and quite pretty but they’re all strangers. Please reply. How are you?
The Valley of the Shadow of Death by Rachel Harbaugh and Sarah Hurd
Silas sat on the rotting porch steps and waited. It seemed he’d been waiting all his life—for the sun to come up, for his Pa to pick him up from school, for the lone plum tree out back to bear fruit, red and sticky-sweet inside.
Grief Sandwiches by Lucas Flatt and Travis Flatt
I’m in the elevator with the angel.
“I’m hungry,” I say.
“You can eat peanut butter again.”
My mother hated the smell of peanut butter. As kids, my brother and I got it all over everything. Mom said it smelled to her like dogshit.